What is different from the Lavra monastery?

Together with the Orthodox Church from the Greek language in Russian it’s a lot of borrowed words. Such words are as the Lavra and the monastery. Literally, Lavra means «street of the city», and the monastery comes from the word «Monos» («one, alone»). In the Russian language these borrowings represent similar but not identical concepts. Let’s see what is different from the Lavra monastery and in what aspects these Orthodox terms converge.

The monastery called the religious community of monks with a single Charter and a single set of economic, liturgical, and sometimes defensive structures. Monasteries appeared in the early 4th century ad: 318 year first written Charter. The founder of the first monastery is considered the Egyptian monk Pachomius the Great. He ordered that a wall fence, located not far from each other the home of Christian hermits and established for them the special order of the day, consisting of a reasonable alternation of prayers and physical labor. The Charter of this monastery, called kinovea (obscenities), were very severe, so later arose the monasteries of another type – idioritmik (osobnosti), living conditions which were less severe than in cinovec. Monasteries in Orthodoxy and in Catholicism can be both male and female, but among the Protestants the monasteries only have the Lutherans, and then some.

Unlike the Lavra monastery:

Lavra – the name of the monastery only in Orthodoxy;

the monastery is the only monastery;

Laurel definitely needs to be a large monastery and to have a special spiritual and historical significance.

How big must be this value, is the fact that in Russia, only two of the Laura of St. Sergius (Sergiev Posad, Moscow region) and Alexander Nevsky (St. Petersburg). There is a monastery and other Orthodox countries – Ukraine, Greece, Romania, Georgia, Serbia, and even in Catholic Poland! In the latter case Supralsky Lavra is located in the East of Poland and belongs to the Polish Orthodox Church.

Besides the above-mentioned kin and idiarity, in Orthodoxy, there are monasteries and other types. For example, desert (stress on first syllable), of which the most famous – the Optina Pustyn in the Kaluga region. Despite the antiquity (founded in the late 14th century) and of great importance for Orthodoxy (deserts during a spiritual quest visited, for example, Leo Tolstoy and Fyodor Dostoevsky), the status of the laurels it received. But has the status of a Stavropegial monastery – this means that it is not subject to the local diocese, but directly to the Patriarch.
And the Trinity-Sergius Lavra (which also has the status of a stavropegic monastery) has been completed GOSUDARSTVENNAYA role. Here Sergius of Radonezh blessed Dmitry (which only later will be called the don) at the battle of Kulikovo. In the early 17th century, the Lavra withstood the siege for almost a year and a half the Polish invaders and became one of the strongholds of the militia of Minin and Pozharsky. And at the end of the same century here to escape the Streltsy rebellion, run away first, Princess Sophia, and then Peter. And here he is in 1689 went back to Moscow – already the absolute ruler of the Russian Kingdom.

What is the difference between a monastery and a convent? If all too briefly, the Lavra is one of the types of monasteries. And the differences presented in this table:

The monasteryLaurel

What is
The community of monks or nuns with a complex of religious, economic, and often defensive structures
Large Orthodox monastery, which is of great spiritual and historical significance

Varieties
Distinguish obscenity (kin) and osobnosti (idioritmik) monasteries, they are male and female. In Orthodoxy there are the following types of monastic settlements of the desert (far from the main monastery) and hermitages (usually the home of monks-hermits)
Varieties of no

The number in Russia
Orthodox monasteries in Russia for nearly eight hundred
Two of the Laura of St. Sergius and Alexander Nevsky